Apple Awards $390 Million to FaceID Tech Company Finisar

Apple Inc. (AAPL) on Wednesday said it awarded $390 million to Finisar Corp. (FNSR), which produces technology used in Apple's facial-recognition.

The award, from Apple's Advanced Manufacturing Fund, will allow Finisar to increase research and development and production of its vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers, or VCSELs. Finisar is Apple's second-largest supplier of VCSELs, which are used in several of Apple's new features on the iPhone X, including Portrait mode selfies, Apple said.

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The news sent Finisar shares up 17% premarket.

Finisar last week said it had started shipping production quantities of the VCSELs. The device is critical to the Apple's FaceID recognition system, providing the 3D sensing capabilities that detect a face. Finisar plans a 700,000-square-foot production facility in Texas to produce VCSEL arrays.

Apple has said it will spend its $1 billion Advanced Manufacturing Fund investing in innovative production at domestic companies. Corning Inc. (GLW) received $200 million from the fund in May to expand high-tech glass processing, which was the fund's first award.